Adaptive Strategy Quotes

I state my general idea of this war to be that we have the greater numbers, and the enemy has the greater facility of concentrating forces upon points of collision; that we must fail, unless we can find some way of making our advantage an over-match for his; and that this can only be done by menacing him with superior forces at different points, at the same time; so that we can safely attack, one, or both, if he makes no change; and if he weakens one to strengthen the other, forbear to attack the strengthened one, but seize, and hold the weakened one, gaining so much.

The enemy resembles us. Therefore, he needs to be approached not as an assembly of 'targets' to be destroyed one by one; but as a living, intelligent entity capable of acting and reacting.

I never see failure as failure, but only as the game I must play and win.

Wherever the fish are, that's where we go.

We can't be in survival mode. We have to be in growth mode.

The ultimate competitive advantage is being cognitive.

Radical activists can't ignore the fact that we live in this world, like it or not, and have to make difficult decisions about which paths are the best - or sometimes, the least harmful. There are no abstract formulas. Have to think through each case on its own.

As you begin to take action toward the fulfillment of your goals and dreams, you must realize that not every action will be perfect. Not every action will produce the desired result. Not every action will work. Making mistakes, getting it almost right, and experimenting to see what happens are all part of the process of eventually getting it right.

Any plan is bad which is incapable of modification.

Test fast, fail fast, adjust fast.

We don't have a traditional strategy process, planning process like you'd find in traditional technical companies. It allows Google to innovate very, very quickly, which I think is a real strength of the company.

I'm necessarily parasitic in a way. I have done well as a parasite. But I'm still a parasite.

You have to adapt your policies to changing circumstances.

The most important work of the executive is to identify the changes that have already happened. The important thing . . . is to exploit the changes that have already occurred and to use them as opportunities.

If it is to your advantage, make a forward move; if not, stay where you are.

As a coach, they would love to sit there and say, 'It's going to be five steps, you're going to hitch up into a perfect pocket, you're going to look at number one - no; you're going to go to number two - no.' It doesn't work that way.

Strategy draws its inspiration each century, or rather at each moment of history, from the problems which events themselves pose.

If evolution was worth its salt, by now it should've evolved something better than survival of the fittest. I think a better idea would be survival of the wittiest.

I try to examine everything to see if there's another approach.

The single biggest reason companies fail is they overinvest in what is, as opposed to what might be.

When one plan that you have, to get this or to get that, to advance in the world, or whatever it might be, when that seems in danger of veering off the path you have set for it, you have your emergency plan ready. And in simple language what that emergency plan is, what you put into operation, is called worry. If you can worry you are occupied, and what an incredible human situation it is!

In the army we are drilled into execution and then supervision, to make sure everything goes the way you planned it. But there is another thing that we do in the military, that I think perhaps isn't done enough in corporate life: As soon as you have made that decision, you start on the contingency planning. Because there is, as we like to say, a thinking, breathing enemy out there, who is not going to let you do just what you want.

I focus on the task and try and do it as best we can. And we're constantly evolving it, because it's my way of trying to make sense of all these ambivalent feelings I have.

Follow the accident, fear the fixed plan--that is the rule.

My greatest gift in life was being dyslexic. It made me special. It made me different. If I had not been dyslexic, I wouldn't have needed sports.